European Journal of Special Needs Education

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Parental satisfaction with disabled children’s

school inclusion in Italy

Mirella Zanobini, Paola Viterbori, Valentina Garello & Roberta Camba

To cite this article: Mirella Zanobini, Paola Viterbori, Valentina Garello & Roberta Camba (2017):
Parental satisfaction with disabled children’s school inclusion in Italy , European Journal of Special
Needs Education, DOI: 10.1080/08856257.2017.1386318

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 European Journal of Special Needs Education, 2017
https://doi.org/10.1080/08856257.2017.1386318

Parental satisfaction with disabled children’s school inclusion

in Italy
Mirella Zanobinia , Paola Viterboria , Valentina Garellob and Roberta Cambab
a
Department of Educational Sciences (Disfor), University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy; bThe Department of
Educational Sciences (Disfor), Idee s.r.l. Intervento sui Disturbi dell’Età Evolutiva, Genoa, Italy
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ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

The principal aim of the present study is to examine the level of Received 4 May 2017
parental satisfaction with inclusive education for their children with Accepted 8 September 2017
disability attending Italian schools of any grade level. The survey KEYWORDS
involved 285 parents of pupils randomly selected from the population School inclusion; parental
of students with disability certificates. On average, parents expressed satisfaction; Italian schools
a high level of satisfaction. Four principal components of parental
satisfaction were extracted from the item scores of the questionnaire:
inclusive educational practices; environment and special equipment;
classmates’ and families’ acceptance; integration between education
and rehabilitation activities. Various correlations were found between
these aspects and both child-related and context-related variables.
In particular, children’s emotional regulation abilities evaluated by
teachers are involved in various dimensions of the parents’ satisfaction.
On the other hand, satisfaction with the integration between the
educational and rehabilitation activities showed a significant negative
correlation with the fathers’ and mothers’ educational level. Lastly,
parental satisfaction towards classmates’ and families’ acceptance
appears to be the most critical aspect and tends to decrease in
relation to school level, while it is positively linked with the number
of hours the support teacher spends in class. Taken together, these
results stimulate useful considerations to promote better practices
in inclusive education.

Introduction
The purpose of this paper is to examine the level of parental satisfaction with inclusive
education for their children in Italy in relation to a number of context-related and child-re-
lated variables.
Despite the increased demands of rearing a child with a disability, many parents are able
to manage the challenges of parenting a disabled child and often experience positive per-
sonal and family outcomes (Scorgie and Sobsey 2000; Taunt and Hastings 2002; Wilgosh et
al. 2004). Family adjustment to children’s developmental disabilities and parents’ well-being
are, in fact, not only affected by the specific parenting demands but also by the characteristics
of the environment, such as access to resources and environmental or social support. Among

CONTACT Mirella Zanobini [email protected]

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
 2  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

these contextual factors, recent research has pointed to the role of an inclusive school envi-
ronment for the well-being of both the disabled children (Underwood 2010) and their parents
(Cappe 2012).
The advantages of an inclusive approach have been largely discussed in the literature;
with regard to children, inclusive education has been associated with a number of positive
outcomes, particularly in the domain of social development (Vianello and Lanfranchi 2015).
Vianello and Lanfranchi (2011), in their review, indicate that inclusive placements – com-
pared to segregated placements – generally reduce disruptive behaviours, produce more
positive academic outcomes, increase social interactions with classmates and promote better
self-concepts in children with both mild and severe intellectual disabilities. Furthermore, no
adverse effects on pupils without disabilities were found when including children with spe-
cial needs in mainstream schools (Kalambouka et al. 2008). Nevertheless, although academic
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achievement of students with and without special educational needs seems to be compa-
rable to non-inclusive classes or even better in inclusive classes, children with special needs
seem to have a less favourable social position than typical developing children (Ruijs and
Peetsma 2009) and to be at risk for experience of loneliness, especially students with Autism
Spectrum Disorders (Bossaert et al. 2012).

The Italian context

The interest in comparing the effects of inclusive and non-inclusive education, which is still
present in the international literature (Knoche et al. 2006; Whitaker 2007; Obiakor et al. 2012),
appears to be unsuitable for the Italian context, in which full inclusion, intended as access
of the pupils in regular classes, has an established history. In Italy, the full inclusion model
was first introduced in the 1970s and has been systematically implemented in the last
40 years (Lauchlan and Fadda 2012). Law 118/1971 started the process of mainstreaming
for civil invalids and physically disabled people. Subsequently, law 517/1977 extended the
policy of inclusive education to every kind of disability and provided additional resources
to ordinary schools, by introducing the role of the support teacher. Finally, the framework
law 104/1992 provided a detailed description of how disabled people should be integrated
in school and in overall social contexts. As stated in law 104 and following applications, the
process of school integration involves four steps: (1) the identification of the impairment;
(2) the Functional Diagnosis, as drawn up by local health services; (3) the Dynamic-Functional
profile; (4) the Individual Educational Plan, jointly developed by teachers, parents and the
clinicians of the local health services.
Currently, children with special needs attend regular classes, from day nurseries to sec-
ondary schools, being provided with all the support needed to access the same curriculum
as their peers. Specialised support teachers are allocated to every class which includes a
child with special needs, as certified on the basis of law 104 criteria, as an integral part of
the teaching staff and participate in all the activities that concern the class as a whole, such
as planning and assessment.
A critical issue of this legislative model is that resource allocation is based on the severity
of the pathology and the diagnosis, as codified with the criteria of the ICD10 (WHO 1992),
rather than according to the functional description of each student’s needs. In this direction,
the Policy Guidelines for the Integration of Pupils with Disabilities at school (MIUR 2009)
stressed the importance of a functional description, based on the ICF-CY (WHO 2007) for
 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION  3

the assessment of pupils with disability. In this vein, various applications of this evaluation
system have been developed in the Italian context (De Polo et al. 2009; Francescutti et al.
2011).
Another critical issue concerns some applications of the inclusion model. Even though
the legislation supports a team teaching model according to which all students have the
same access to both regular and support teachers within the general education classroom,
in many situations the specialised teachers are mostly used to support the education of
learners with disabilities (D’Alessio 2013).
Moreover, the student’s presence in regular classes per se cannot guarantee access to a
shared curriculum (Obiakor et al. 2012). As suggested by D’Alessio (2011) and Zanobini
(2013), micro-exclusion can also be found in fully inclusive settings – for example, when
students with disabilities receive a substantial amount of their instruction outside the class-
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room. In the same vein, Nepi et al. (2013) found that Italian students with disabilities showed
feelings of poor acceptance within their class, suggesting that physical inclusion in regular
classes is not sufficient to increase an effective participation for students with special needs.
Given these findings, whereas in many countries the debate is focused on the opportu-
nities and limitations of full inclusion compared to segregated education placements, in
Italy more attention is paid to analyse the factors associated with better outcomes for chil-
dren and their families. The limited research on this model of inclusion suggests that the
majority of teachers and parents have a positive view about it in Italy (Balboni and Pedrabissi
2000; Reversi et al. 2007; Lauchlan and Fadda 2012); nevertheless, a number of issues have
been raised regarding the quality of inclusiveness in Italian schools (Anastasiou, Kauffman,
and Di Nuovo 2015). The main concerns pertain to the collaboration between support teach-
ers and general education teachers, and the percentage of time that pupils with disabilities
actually spend in the classroom (Giangreco, Doyle, and Suter 2014).
In this regard, different studies (Ditrano and Silverstein 2006; Starr and Foy 2012) empha-
sised the importance of relying on parents’ voices to evaluate the quality of their children’s
inclusion.

Parental satisfaction of school inclusion

Perception of parents towards inclusive education is varied and multifaceted and likely
depends on the way inclusiveness is implemented in different countries. However, the studies
reviewed by Duhaney and Salend (2000) indicated that parents of children with disabilities
generally hold positive perceptions about inclusive educational placement, mainly because
they believe that inclusive education may foster the acceptance of their children by typically
developing peers, enhance their children’s self-concept and better prepare their children
for the real word, in addition to providing access to appropriate role models. The concerns
of parents regarding inclusion are generally related to the availability of specialised services
and qualified personnel, also when they express a high degree of satisfaction with their
child’s progress and with the positive relationships with teachers (Leyser and Kirk 2011).
In analysing the factors associated with a positive or resistive view of inclusive education,
Palmer et al. (1998) found that, among parents of children with severe disabilities, those who
had more positive attitudes towards inclusion generally placed a high value on socialisation,
had children with fewer behavioural problems, had less of a need for specialised services
and had more experience with inclusive education programmes. Parsons et al. (2009),
 4  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

examining the influence of attitudinal and environmental factors on the satisfaction of a

large sample of parents, found that the least satisfied parents were those who described
their child as having psychosocial difficulties. Other factors such as parental self-efficacy,
perceived involvement with their children’s education and perceived school climate were
found to be associated with parental satisfaction (Laws and Millward 2001).
In summary, the literature suggests that a number of variables mediate the level of sat-
isfaction with inclusive education; some of these variables are related to the child’s charac-
teristics (e.g. severe vs. mild disabilities) while others pertain to contextual aspects (e.g.
parents’ socio-economic background). Nevertheless, the available studies often focus on a
single disorder, mostly autism (Whitaker 2007), or are limited to a single school level.
Moreover, at least with regard to the Italian context, no study has analysed the level of
parental satisfaction in relation to different aspects of inclusive education and to different
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child-related and contextual variables.

The literature suggests that parental satisfaction with inclusive education is multidimen-
sional and concerns a number of different aspects, including the ability of the school per-
sonnel to effectively manage children’s behaviours, the teachers’ understanding and
knowledge of the disability, and effective communication between teachers and parents
(Starr and Foy 2012; Al Jabery et al. 2014). In this vein, the primary purpose of the present
study is to better define the construct of parental satisfaction.
Secondly, we intend to describe the relationship between parental satisfaction with inclu-
sive education experiences and different variables, particularly child-related variables (the
severity and nature of the disability; children’s learning and socio-emotional outcomes as
evaluated by teachers) and context-related variables (parents’ education; number of hours
of support teacher assistance; time spent in the classroom; child’s school level). The following
research questions guided our study: Does parental satisfaction represent a unitary or mul-
tidimensional construct, namely is it possible to identify different dimensions of parental
satisfaction related to the child’s school experience? Which aspects of parental satisfaction
are primarily correlated to child-related variables? Which aspects of parental satisfaction are
primarily correlated to context-related variables?

Methods
Sample and procedure
A total of 285 parents of disabled students participated in the study. The sample was
extracted from a population of 2626 students with disability certificates who attended
schools at any level in the principal town of a Northern Italy region. 208 students were
excluded because of diagnoses that were not clearly formulated.
Using a stratified sampling procedure for the remaining population (n = 2418), 581 stu-
dents (1/4 of the entire population plus 10%) attending 88 schools including Istituti com-
prensivi and upper secondary schools were randomly selected. Istituti comprensivi are
comprehensive schools that include at least a pre-primary school (children aged 3–5), a
primary school (children aged 6–10) and a lower secondary school (children aged 11–13).
Students were selected on the basis of the four following parameters:

(1) Diagnosis (based on ICD-10):

• mental retardation;
 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION  5

• pervasive developmental disorders;

• behavioural/emotional disorders;
• somato-sensorial disorders;
• multiple disabilities;
• disorders related to psychological development.
(2) Geographic areas where the schools are located (13 areas in total).
(3) School level (Pre-school, age 3–6; Primary school, age 6–11; Middle school, age
11–14; High school, age 14–19).
(4) Grade attended within each school level (e.g. for Primary school: 1st Grade to 5th
Grade)

The aims and methods of the study were presented to the headmasters of the 88 Istituti
comprensivi and upper secondary schools randomly selected for the parental survey; 70
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agreed to participate and explained the study aims and methods to the teaching staff of
their schools. The support teachers of all students with disabilities who were selected for
the study delivered the parental satisfaction questionnaire to the parents of the children
involved and completed the questionnaires about learning outcomes, autonomy and
social-emotional outcomes. All parents were informed about the aims and methods of the
study by means of a letter, and written consent to participate was requested for each child.
The parental satisfaction survey was conducted from April to September 2013. A total of 57
Istituti comprensivi and upper secondary schools of the 70 selected returned at least a part
of the questionnaires completed. The final sample included 382 pupils who were attending
153 schools from 57 Institutes (see Figure 1). A total of 285 parents (74% of the final sample)
returned the questionnaires completed.
Regarding the types of disability, the final sample included children with the following
diagnoses: mental retardation (17%), pervasive developmental disorders (15%), behavioural/
emotional disorders (14%), somato-sensorial disabilities (21%), multiple disabilities (10%)
and disorders related to psychological development (23%). About half of the sample (52%)

Total population: 2626

Disabled students in the province of Genoa (school year 2011-12)

excluded 208 (unspecified diagnosis)

581 children
(1/4 of the population +10% - 88 scholastic institutes)

474 children (70 scholastic institutes out of 88 sampled withdrew the questionnaires

382 participants (57 scholastic institutes out of 70 returned the completed

questionnaires)

285 parents compiled the parental satisfaction questionnaire

Figure 1. Sample.
 6  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

was classified as severely disabled. The distribution of the diagnosis according to the school
level is reported in Table 1.
With regard to context-related variables, the mean number of years of formal education
for both mothers and fathers was 11; as regards children, 3% attended a preschool, 38%
primary school, 36% junior secondary school and 22% high school. The number of hours
the support teachers were allocated to the classes with a disabled child ranged from 4 to 40
(mean = 12.3, SD = 6.75), and the disabled children spent approximately 81% of time at
school in their classroom (range of 0–100%).

Measures
Parental satisfaction was evaluated with a questionnaire that was composed of 19 items and
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was adapted from the ISIS System (Indagine di Soddisfazione dell’Integrazione Scolastica,
Satisfaction of School Inclusion Survey, Crispiani and Giaconi 2009), an evaluation system
involving all the participants in the inclusion process of children with disabilities, that aimed
to investigate various aspects: institutional and organizational aspects, clinical indexes, aca-
demic outcomes, and parental satisfaction. The parents’ questionnaire examined satisfaction
with the inclusive practices adopted by the school; quality of the relationships with school-
mates and their parents; school environment; school engagement and cooperation with
other professionals, social and health services, and parents; and attention to the students’
special needs. The level of satisfaction was evaluated with a five-point Likert Scale: very
satisfied, quite satisfied, uncertain, not very satisfied, not at all satisfied (range 1–5).
The child-related variables considered were the following:

(1) severity and type of disability: this information – based on the diagnostic assessment
– was extracted from the database of students certified for a disability from the
Regional Education Office; severity was defined as a dichotomous variable (severe
or not severe) following the definition of the framework law 104/1992, article 3:
the situation can be judged severe when the impairment – single or multiple -has
reduced the age-related personal autonomy so as to make necessary permanent,
continuous, and comprehensive assistance in the individual or interpersonal sphere;
learning outcomes and autonomy, evaluated through a questionnaire that was com-
(2) 
pleted by the support teachers and adapted from the ISIS System (Crispiani and
Giaconi 2009). The questionnaire, composed of 12 items, consists of four scales:
improvement in learning outcomes (mathematics, language, science, motor skills, 4
items); maintenance and generalisation of learning outcomes (2 items); achievement

Table 1. Distribution of diagnoses according to school level.

School levels
Pre-school Primary Middle Secondary Total
Diagnosis Mental retardation 2 29 27 18 76
Pervasive developmental disorders 1 27 13 9 50
Behavioural/Emotional disorders 2 17 17 23 59
Somato-sensorial disorders 4 30 19 24 77
Multiple disabilities 1 13 13 7 34
Psychological development disorders 0 33 30 23 86
Total 10 149 119 104 382
 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION  7

gap between the disabled child and his/her classmates (1 item); and personal and
scholastic autonomy (self-care, interpersonal relationships, free time management,
performance in simple tasks, performance in complex tasks; 5 items). Learning out-
comes and autonomy were evaluated by means of a five-point Likert Scale: very
good, good, appropriate, poor, very poor (range 1–5);
(3) social-emotional outcomes, evaluated by means of the Italian version of the Leiter
social-emotional rating scale for teachers, which includes two subscales: the
Cognitive/Social subscale, composed of four subscales aimed to evaluate Attention,
11 items Organisation/Impulse Control, 6 items; Activity Level, 7 items; Sociability, 8
items, and a Total score; the Emotions/Regulation subscale, composed of four sub-
scales aimed to evaluate Energy and Feelings, 4 items; Regulation, 5 items; Anxiety, 4
items; Sensory Reaction, 7 items, and a Total score. Each subscale includes a checklist
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of target behaviours, each of which are represented from two opposite descriptions
(appropriate behaviour vs. unsuitable behaviour: e.g. he/she persists in perform-
ing difficult tasks vs he/she doesn’t persist; he/she easily adapts to changes in the
environment vs he/she finds it difficult to adapt to changes in the environment),
and the teacher chooses between three options: 1 = unsuitable; 2 = intermedium;
3 = appropriate. The reliabilities range from .82 (children between 11 and 20 years)
and .99 (children between 2 and 5 years) for the Cognitive/Social subscale and from
.73 (children between 11 and 20 years) and .99 (children between 2 and 5 years)
for the Emotions/Regulation subscale (Roid and Miller 1997). The social-emotional
rating scale was completed by the support teacher.

The context-related variables considered were the following:

(1) parents’ education (five levels: primary school; middle school; vocational education;
high school; academic degree); children’s school grade (four levels: preschool; pri-
mary school; middle school; high school); and number of hours the support teacher is
assigned to the student’s class. These data were collected by means of a personal data
survey completed by the parents (adapted from Zanobini, Manetti, and Usai 2002);
(2) an inclusion index (Di Nuovo 2012), the proportion of hours the child effectively spends
in class as indicated by the support teachers and calculated as the ratio between the
number of hours the disabled student spends in class and the number of instruc-
tional hours per school day expected.

Results
Parental satisfaction
In order to better describe the construct of parental satisfaction with school inclusion, a
principal component analysis (PCA) with oblimin rotation was applied to the item scores of
the 285 questionnaires compiled by parents. Four principal components with eigenvalues
above 1.00 were extracted, which accounted for 73% of the total variance. The component
loadings on the rotated matrix are reported in Table 2. A loading above .45 was used as a
criterion for interpreting the components (Tabachnick and Fidell 1996).
The first component accounted for 53% of the variance and included nine items, which
assessed satisfaction with the inclusive educational practices of the school, such as the way
 8  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

Table 2. Principal component analysis for questionnaire item scores. Rotated Component Matrix (oblim-
in).
Relationship with
Environment and Classmates and educational/ spe-
Parental satisfaction Inclusive practices equipment families cialised services
Classroom .793
environment
School environment .930
Special equipment and .573
common spaces
Willingness and .890
helpfulness of
classmates
Understanding of the .761
child’s condition
from the families of
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the classmates
Sharing of aims and .678
procedures between
the school and
specialised Services
Communication and .948
cooperation
between school and
specialised services
Affinity between .923
rehabilitative and
didactic intervention
Relationship between .696
curricular and
individualised
activities
Use of the support .596
teacher
Overall availability of .671
the school staff
School welcome .799
project for the child
Attention to the child’s .898
adjustment
Parents’ involvement in .568
the Individualised
Educational
Programme
School perception of .879
the child’s special
needs
School activities to .880
meet the child’s
special needs
Current response to .795
the child’s special
needs
School’s attention to .751
the child’s individual
characteristics
Involvement of the .459
non-teaching staff

the school welcomed the child and perceived and met his/her special needs. The second
component accounted for 8% of the variance and included three items that assessed satis-
faction with the environment (classrooms and common spaces) and the special equipment
 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION  9

available in the school. The third component accounted for 7% of the variance and included
two items that assessed satisfaction with the way classmates and their families accepted
and supported the inclusion of the child with special needs. The fourth component accounted
for 5% of the variance and included five items that assessed satisfaction with the integration
between education and rehabilitation activities.
On the basis of these components, four indices were created as the average scores of the
items (range 1–5 for each component). The internal consistency was high across the indices,
with Cronbach’s alpha ranging from .76 (satisfaction with classmates and their families) to
.94 (satisfaction with the inclusive educational practices of the school).
The results indicate that the level of parental satisfaction was quite high for each dimen-
sion (Table 3). Furthermore, each pair of the four component scores was compared via six
paired sample t-test (Table 4). This analysis allows evaluating which components where
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evaluated more positively compared to the others (see Kuschner, Bennetto, and Yost 2007).
In addition, we report effect sizes for all pairs of comparisons using d for matched pair
designs, for which a small effect is roughly defined at .2, a medium effect at .5, and a large
effect at .8. The results indicate that the component assessing inclusive practices was eval-
uated more positively compared to all the others, whereas satisfaction with the environment
and satisfaction with classmates’ and families’ acceptance received the lowest evaluation.
No statistically significant difference was found between these two components.

Associations between satisfaction and child-related variables

We compared the level of parental satisfaction according to severity and type of disability;
we then correlated the level of parental satisfaction with learning outcomes, autonomy and
social-emotional outcomes as evaluated by support teachers.
The nature of the disability was not associated with satisfaction (Table 5). The severity of
the disability was only associated with satisfaction with the way the other classmates and
their families accepted and supported the inclusion of the child with special needs: parents
whose children were classified as severe cases were more satisfied.
The distribution of scores for children’s learning outcomes and autonomy, as evaluated
by support teachers, are reported in Table 6. The support teachers tended to give medium
scores on the learning outcomes and levels of autonomy for the disabled students, with the
highest rating for autonomy with self-care and the lowest for the performance of complex
tasks.
In Table 7 the correlations between parental satisfaction and support teachers’ evaluation
of learning and socio-emotional outcomes are reported. The children’s maintenance of learn-
ing outcomes, as evaluated by the support teachers, mildly correlated with parental satis-
faction. Conversely, the improvement and generalisation of learning outcomes were not

Table 3. Distribution of parental satisfaction scores in each scale and percentage of parents with low
parental satisfaction in each scale.
Min Max Mean (SD) Parental satisfaction score < 3 (%)
Inclusive practices 1.33 5.00 4.21 (.78) 9.4
Relationship educational/ specialised services 1.60 5.00 4.08 (.82) 10.9
Environment and equipment 1.33 5.00 3.84 (.82) 11.4
Classmates and families 1.00 5.00 3.92 (1.03) 10.5
 10  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

Table 4. Within-groups comparisons between satisfaction component scores.

Differences between components (SD) t p d
Inclusive practices – Relationship educational/ .14 (.54) 3.77 .001 0.23
specialised services
Inclusive practices – Environment and .37 (.72) 7.98 .001 0.51
equipment
Inclusive practices – Classmates and families .30 (.89) 5.33 .001 0.27
Relationship educational/ specialised services .22 (.76) 4.49 .001 0.31
– Environment and equipment
Relationship educational/ specialised services .14 (.99) 2.18 .030 0.16
– Classmates and families
Environment and equipment – Classmates and −.08 (1.07) −1.19 .236 0.07
families
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Table 5. Levels of parents’ satisfaction according to children’s diagnosis and severity.

Relationship educa-
tional/ specialised Environment and Classmates and
Inclusive practices services equipment families
Mean (SD) Mean (SD) Mean (SD) Mean (SD)
Diagnosis
Mental retardation 4.12 (.75) 3.99 (.90) 3.69 (.89) 3.89 (1.08)
 Pervasive 4.37 (.62) 4.07 (.86) 3.95 (.86) 4.17 (.80)
developmental
disorders
Behavioural/ 4.10 (.88) 4.17 (.69) 3.76 (.75) 3.76 (.97)
Emotional disorders
Somato-sensorial 4.37 (.85) 4.18 (.85) 3.95 (.76) 4.08 (1.01)
disorders
Multiple disabilities 4.02 (.95) 3.89 (1.02) 3.78 (.89) 3.05 (1.11)
 Psychological 4.15 (.70) 4.12 (.68) 3.86 (.81) 3.91 (1.11)
development
disorders
  F 1.35 .64 .73 1.83
  p .24 .67 .60 .11
Severity
 Not severe 4.15 (.76) 4.08 (.78) 3.84 (.77) 3.76 (.89)
Severe 4.27 (.81) 4.09 (.86) 3.84 (.86) 4.07 (1.1)
  t −1.17 −.14 .01 −2.44
  p .24 .88 .99 .01

Table 6. Distribution of learning outcome, autonomy and socio-emotional scores as evaluated by the
support teachers.
Mean (SD)
Learning outcomes
 Improvement in learning outcomes 2.9 (.79)
Maintenance of learning outcomes 3 (.98)
Generalisation of learning outcomes 2.7 (.89)
 Achievement gap 2.9 (1.04)
Autonomy
Self-care 3.6 (1.16)
 Interpersonal relationships 3.1 (1.07)
 Free time management 2.9 (1.08)
 Performance in simple tasks 3.2 (0.97)
 Performance in complex tasks 2.2 (0.92)
Socio-emotional outcomes
 Cognitive/Social composite score 70.8 (13.4)
Emotions/Regulation composite score 46.9 (7.17)
 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION  11

Table 7. Correlations between parental satisfaction and children’s learning outcomes and Leiter com-
posite scores, as evaluated by the support teachers.
Relationship edu-
cational/specialised Environment and Classmates and
Inclusive practices services equipment families
Learning outcomes
 Improvement in .06 .01 .01 .11
learning outcomes
Maintenance of .20** .14* .14* .15*
learning outcomes
Generalisation of .08 .06 .07 .03
learning outcomes
 Achievement gap .13 .17* .04 .10
Autonomy
Self-care .04 .04 .06 .04
 Interpersonal .10 .12 .01 .21**
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relationships
 Free time −.01 .03 -.02 .04
management
 Performance in .12 .08 .11 .10
simple tasks
 Performance in .07 .06 .05 .06
complex tasks
Leiter composite scores
 Cognitive social .05 .03 −.02 .10
composite
Emotion regulation .15* .21 ** .11 .17*
composite

*p < .05.;
**p < .001.

associated with any dimensions of parental satisfaction; the achievement gap between the
child with disabilities and his/her classmates was specifically associated with satisfaction
with the integration between the education and rehabilitation activities, indicating that a
smaller gap was associated with higher satisfaction.
No dimension of autonomy, as evaluated by the support teachers, was associated with
parental satisfaction except for a significant correlation between the level of autonomy in
interpersonal relationships and parental satisfaction with the classmates’ and families’ accept-
ance of the child with special needs (r = .213; p = .001).
Finally, three out of four dimensions of parental satisfaction correlated with the Emotions/
Regulation composite score of the Leiter rating scale, suggesting that parental satisfaction
is more strongly associated with emotional rather than cognitive outcomes.

Associations between satisfaction and context-related variables

We correlated parental satisfaction with parental education, number of hours the support
teacher was assigned to the disabled student’s class and the proportion of hours spent in
the class by the disabled student; we then compared the level of parental satisfaction accord-
ing to the grade level of the children.
In Table 8, the correlations between parental satisfaction and context-related variables
are reported. Both mothers’ and fathers’ education was negatively correlated with the
 12  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

Table 8. Correlations between parental satisfaction and context-related variables.

Relationship educa-
tional/ specialised Environment and Classmates and
Inclusive practices services equipment families
Maternal education −.13 −.15* −.10 .018
Paternal education −.12 −.18* −.09 .016
Hours spent in class .02 .02 .05 .016
Hours of support .12 .06 −.02 .23**
teacher
*p < .05;
**p < .001.

component assessing satisfaction with the integration between education and rehabilitation
activities.
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The number of hours of support teacher was only associated with satisfaction with the
way the other classmates and their families accepted and supported the inclusion of the
child with special needs (r = .23, p = .002); no correlation was found between parental sat-
isfaction and the time spent in the class by the child.
Finally, no difference in satisfaction was found between the school levels of the children,
except for the level of parental satisfaction with the classmates’ and families’ acceptance of
the child with special needs, which decreased significantly with the increase of the school
level of the child (Table 9). In particular, the post hoc comparisons indicate that the parents
of children in the preschool and in primary school were more satisfied with the acceptance
of their child by the classmates and their families compared to parents of children attending
middle and secondary school.

Discussion
The principal aim of the study was to explore the level of parental satisfaction with inclusive
education for their children. The research on this subject is still not widespread, especially
in the Italian context, which is different from the contexts of other countries where the
process of inclusion is not yet well established. Most studies are, in fact, aimed at comparing
parental satisfaction with inclusive versus segregated placements and generally focus on
one specific type of disability. In the present study, we considered a large sample that was
representative of the various types of disabilities and of all school levels to explore the rela-
tionship between child-related and context-related variables and parental satisfaction.

Table 9. Levels of parental satisfaction according to school level of the children.

Relationship educa-
tional/ specialised Environment and Classmates and
Inclusive practices services equipment families
Mean (SD) Mean (SD) Mean (SD) Mean (SD)
Pre-school 4.72 (.36) 4.70 (.40) 4.38 (.57) 4.75 (.37)
Primary 4.21 (.84) 4.10 (.82) 3.79 (.90) 4.14 (.96)
Middle 4.10 (.83) 3.98 (.87) 3.82 (.81) 3.72 (1.10)
Secondary 4.30 (.60) 4.12 (.76) 3.90 (.71) 3.73 (1.00)
F 1.96 2.05 1.37 5.20
p .12 .11 .25 .002
 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION  13

In line with other studies (Knoche et al. 2006; Underwood 2010; Cappe 2012), parents
generally expressed a high level of satisfaction, with a low percentage of parents declaring
themselves to be only a little or not at all satisfied with various aspects of their children’s
school-related experience. Our findings also indicate that parental satisfaction is multifaceted
and that different components can be identified. These components are differently associ-
ated to child-related and context-related variables.
Firstly, specific types of disability did not show any link to parental satisfaction. Even
though the type of disability can be useful in a medical context to identify and distinguish
children according to their diagnosis, in a social context, such as school, other aspects are
important in affecting parental satisfaction with their children’s inclusion. The medical diag-
nosis classifies children according to symptomatology, nevertheless children with the same
diagnosis may show different characteristics and skills. For example, our results indicated
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that emotional regulation evaluated by teachers was slightly but significantly associated
with almost all measures of parental satisfaction, suggesting that the ability to self-regulate
behaviours and emotional responses may contribute to make easier school inclusion and
consequently parental satisfaction. In line with this hypothesis, some studies showed that
the behaviour of students with disabilities appears to be an important dimension in influ-
encing peer acceptance (de Boer et al. 2013), in some cases more important than intelligence,
academic achievement, and physical attractiveness (Erhardt and Hinshaw 1994). On the
other hand, it is possible that the cooperation between the adults involved in the educational
process contributed to promote more functional emotional regulation competences in chil-
dren. These findings should be interpreted cautiously, considering that emotional regulation
was evaluated through the use of a rating scale for teachers and not with a direct
measure.
Among child-related variables, in addition to emotional regulation, also the severity
of disability showed an association with the parents’ satisfaction that was relative to
acceptance by other classmates and their families. The parents of more severely disabled
children were more satisfied with the relationships with non-disabled students and their
families, which is different from what was expected based on the results of previous
research (Lyons, Cappadocia, and Weiss 2011). Nevertheless, Resch et al. (2010), in attempt-
ing to identify specific sources of challenge for parents raising a child with a disability,
highlighted that parental well-being is not only affected by the caregiving burden but
also by the person–environment interaction. Based on these considerations, a possible
explanation for the greater satisfaction of parents of children with more severe disabilities
towards peers’ acceptance can be found in the light of the positive link between parents’
satisfaction in this field and the number of hours spent with support teachers. Indeed,
more compromised children usually benefit from a greater amount of support, and parents
may perceive the role of the support teacher as that of a positive mediator with peers and
their families.
As far as learning outcomes are concerned, parental satisfaction in all the examined fields
was linked with the maintenance of competences over time but not with improvements in
learning outcomes in various fields (mathematics, language, science, motor skills), nor with
the generalisation of learning outcomes to extracurricular contexts. This result is not easy
to explain. Other studies (Underwood 2010) have shown that parents’ satisfaction is con-
nected with social and academic achievements and the level of the child’s improvement
 14  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

during the school year. Our results suggest that parents are particularly satisfied with school
competences that appear stable over time. Moreover, parents appreciate learning improve-
ments in terms of the reduction of the achievement gap between the disabled child and
his/her classmates: when the individual curriculum is closer to the curricula of other students
in the class, the parents are more satisfied with the response of the school to the children’s
needs and the cooperation between support teachers, curricular teachers, other profession-
als, and the parents themselves. Finally, as expected, the level of autonomy in interpersonal
relationships as evaluated by teachers was positively related to parental satisfaction towards
acceptance by the classmates and families.
As far as the correlation between satisfaction and contextual variables is concerned, sat-
isfaction with the degree of cooperation between the adults involved in the educational
and rehabilitation process showed a significant negative correlation with parental educa-
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tional. As shown in previous studies (Zanobini, Manetti, and Usai 2002), less educated parents
tend to be more satisfied with at least some aspects of the supplied services. Individuals
with higher education levels are likely to be exposed to information to a greater degree and
consequently have better knowledge about the best practices of inclusive education. For
this reason, parents with higher levels of education report less satisfaction with school prac-
tices and feel more comfortable criticising the school than parents with lower education
levels (Kohl, Lengua, and McMahon 2000). Moreover, because they feel themselves to be
effective in helping their children with their school work, they are more sensitive to effective
collaboration with teachers.
Satisfaction with classmates’ and families’ acceptance tends to decrease in relation to
grade level, as shown in other studies, with regard to the decreasing number of friends
outside the school for older children (Lyons, Cappadocia, and Weiss 2011) and the overall
satisfaction of parents with children’s education (Starr and Foy 2012): parents of children
attending secondary school perceive their children as more isolated and less accepted than
the parents of younger children.
As stated before, the number of hours the support teacher is assigned to the disabled
child’s class is positively linked with parents’ satisfaction with classmates’ and families’ accept-
ance, in contrast to other studies that found a negative correlation between peer acceptance
and the presence of a teacher assistant because it could reduce the possibility of contact
with peers (de Boer et al. 2013). To understand this result, it is important to underline that
in Italy, differently from other countries, the support teacher has been considered, from the
passage of the very first laws – the teacher of the entire class, with a professionally high
profile and an important role in promoting a full inclusion context. Nevertheless, the number
of hours that the child actually spends in the classroom, which is considered an indicator of
full inclusion (Di Nuovo 2012; Giangreco, Doyle, and Suter 2012), does not show any link
with parents’ satisfaction.

Limitations of the study and future research

The current results should be considered in the context of the study’s limitations.
The overall satisfaction of parents was high. On the one hand, this result made it difficult
to identify clearly the possible causes of dissatisfaction. On the other hand, this result could
be partly attributed to self-selection in the sample. Indeed, 26% of parents did not return
the questionnaires and a number of schools that were contacted decided not to participate.
 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION  15

It is possible that the schools and the parents who did participate in the survey held more
positive attitudes towards inclusive practices than those who did not participate (de Boer
et al. 2012). Secondly, the questionnaire we used had some limitations. For example, some
areas of parental satisfaction, such as classmates’ and families’ acceptance, were represented
by few items; in addition, the use of a fixed-choice questionnaire did not allow the respond-
ents to clarify issues or discuss themes that could be relevant for some parents. Further
research should explore parental satisfaction about school inclusion using different methods,
such as interviews, narratives and focus groups, also in order to collect information about
possible areas of dissatisfaction.
Moreover, most correlations found between parental satisfaction and both child-related
and contextual variables were very low and this limits the strength of possible interpretations.
Finally, the results indicated different topics that should be better explored, such as the
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reasons why parental satisfaction decreases with school grade.

Conclusions
Despite the limitations, the results allowed highlighting significant links between different
types of variables and different sources of parental satisfaction that can be useful to promote
better policies and practices in inclusive education. First, children’s emotional regulation
abilities as well as the maintenance of acquired competences as evaluated by teachers are
involved in various dimensions of the parents’ satisfaction. Conversely, diagnosis was not
associated with parental satisfaction. These results suggest that the social functioning of
the child, irrespective of the nature of the disability, is considered an important aspect for
parents that should be promoted within the educational settings.
Another result that should be highlighted is the decrease of parental satisfaction with
peer acceptance across school grades. This result possibly indicates that in early grades
teachers are more prone to promote social and emotional skills in pupils, for example by
teaching appropriate social behaviours and by providing guidance to identify others’ emo-
tions. Furthermore, during preschool and primary school children have more opportunities
to share positive interactions during play or group activities. The transition to secondary
school can be particularly critical for disabled students that may lack the social support they
received in early grades, both from adults and peers. This suggests the need to implement
strategies to promote social interaction also with adolescents.
Finally, including parents’ view about school inclusion could help identify aspects that
are more important to families and aspects that can be improved. Open boundaries in rela-
tion to students’ families and communities are considered among the guiding principles of
successful inclusion (Obiakor et al. 2012).

Acknowledgements
The authors thank all the schools, the teachers, the parents, and the students who participated to the
research.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
 16  M. ZANOBINI ET AL.

Funding
This work was supported by the Regional Education Office for Liguria, Genoa Sector.

Notes on contributors
Mirella Zanobini is a full Professor in Developmental and Educational Psychology at the University
of Genoa. Her research interests include cognitive profiles of children with autism; quality of school
inclusion; typical and atypical language acquisition in early childhood.
Paola Viterbori Paola Viterbori is an assistant professor in Developmental and Educational Psychology
at the University of Genoa. Her research interests include typical and atypical language acquisition
and the development of executive function and self-regulatory skills in childhood.
Valentina Garello holds PhD degree in Cognitive Psychology at the University of Genoa (Italy) and
Downloaded by [Australian National University] at 05:08 07 October 2017

specialization in Psychotherapy. She is currently President of the spinoff Idee s.r.l. Intervento sui Disturbi
dell’Età Evolutiva [Intervention with Developmental Disorders].
Roberta Camba holds a PhD degree in Cognitive Psychology at the University of Genoa (Italy) and spe-
cialization in Clinical Psychology. She is currently Deputy President of the spinoff Idee s.r.l. Intervento
sui Disturbi dell’Età Evolutiva [Intervention with Developmental Disorders].

ORCID
Mirella Zanobini http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8646-3767
Paola Viterbori http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0241-646X
Roberta Camba http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4131-9731

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